-
The Imaginary Museum
- A Personal Tour of Contemporary Art featuring ghosts, nudity and disagreements
- Narrated by: Matt Bates
- Length: 2 hrs
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Prime members: New to Audible?Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
The Imaginary Museum
Buy for $14.51
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Bowie
- By: Simon Critchley, Eric Hanson
- Narrated by: Simon Critchley
- Length: 1 hr and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 124
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 111
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 111
Simon Critchley first encountered David Bowie in the early '70s, when the singer appeared on Britain's most-watched music show, Top of the Pops. His performance of "Starman" mesmerized Critchley: it was "so sexual, so knowing, so strange". Two days later Critchley's mum bought a copy of the single; she liked both the song and the performer's bright orange hair (she had previously been a hairdresser). The seed of a lifelong love affair was thus planted in the mind of her son, aged 12.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
the best music culture theory book that exists
- By Thomas on 02-20-15
By: Simon Critchley, and others
-
Why We Make Things and Why It Matters
- The Education of a Craftsman
- By: Peter Korn
- Narrated by: Traber Burns
- Length: 5 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,015
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 895
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 887
In this moving account, Peter Korn explores the nature and rewards of creative practice. We follow his search for meaning as an Ivy-educated child of the middle class who finds employment as a novice carpenter on Nantucket, transitions to self-employment as a designer and maker of fine furniture, takes a turn at teaching and administration at Colorado's Anderson Ranch Arts Center, and then founds a school in Maine: the Center for Furniture Craftsmanship, an internationally respected nonprofit institution.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Must Read
- By Ray on 06-19-14
By: Peter Korn
-
The Lonely City
- Adventures in the Art of Being Alone
- By: Olivia Laing
- Narrated by: Susan Lyons
- Length: 9 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 284
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 236
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 233
An expertly crafted work of reportage, memoir, and biography on the subject of loneliness told through the lives of six iconic artists, by the acclaimed author of The Trip to Echo Spring. You can be lonely anywhere, but there is a particular flavor to the loneliness that comes from living in a city, surrounded by thousands of strangers. The Lonely City is a roving cultural history of urban loneliness, centered on the ultimate city: Manhattan, that teeming island of gneiss, concrete, and glass.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Not what I wanted
- By Katarina Riesing on 06-04-18
By: Olivia Laing
-
How to Be an Artist
- By: Jerry Saltz
- Narrated by: Jerry Saltz
- Length: 2 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 534
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 431
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 424
Art has the power to change our lives. For many, becoming an artist is a lifelong dream. But how to make it happen? In How to Be an Artist, Jerry Saltz, one of the art world’s most celebrated and passionate voices, offers an indispensable handbook for creative people of all kinds. From the first sparks of inspiration - and how to pursue them without giving in to self-doubt - Saltz offers invaluable insight into what really matters to emerging artists: originality, persistence, a balance between knowledge and intuition, and that most precious of qualities, self-belief.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Terrible Book Waste of Money
- By Classic on 04-22-20
By: Jerry Saltz
-
Bobos in Paradise
- The New Upper Class and How They Got There
- By: David Brooks
- Narrated by: David Brooks
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 276
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 142
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 139
It used to be pretty easy to distinguish between the bourgeois world of capitalism and the bohemian counterculture. The bourgeois worked for corporations, wore gray, and went to church. The bohemians were artists and intellectuals. Bohemians championed the values of the liberated 1960s; the bourgeois were the enterprising yuppies of the 1980s.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
A magazine article stretched to book length
- By Brian on 08-17-03
By: David Brooks
-
What W. H. Auden Can Do for You
- Alexander McCall Smith
- By: Alexander McCall Smith
- Narrated by: William Neenan
- Length: 2 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 105
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 93
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 89
When facing a moral dilemma, Isabel Dalhousie--Edinburgh philosopher, amateur detective, and title character of a series of novels by best-selling author Alexander McCall Smith - often refers to the great twentieth-century poet W. H. Auden. This is no accident: McCall Smith has long been fascinated by Auden. Indeed, the novelist, best known for his No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series, calls the poet not only the greatest literary discovery of his life but also the best of guides on how to live.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
On the Power of Poetry, Mostly Auden's
- By Rich S. on 12-09-13
-
Bowie
- By: Simon Critchley, Eric Hanson
- Narrated by: Simon Critchley
- Length: 1 hr and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 124
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 111
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 111
Simon Critchley first encountered David Bowie in the early '70s, when the singer appeared on Britain's most-watched music show, Top of the Pops. His performance of "Starman" mesmerized Critchley: it was "so sexual, so knowing, so strange". Two days later Critchley's mum bought a copy of the single; she liked both the song and the performer's bright orange hair (she had previously been a hairdresser). The seed of a lifelong love affair was thus planted in the mind of her son, aged 12.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
the best music culture theory book that exists
- By Thomas on 02-20-15
By: Simon Critchley, and others
-
Why We Make Things and Why It Matters
- The Education of a Craftsman
- By: Peter Korn
- Narrated by: Traber Burns
- Length: 5 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,015
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 895
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 887
In this moving account, Peter Korn explores the nature and rewards of creative practice. We follow his search for meaning as an Ivy-educated child of the middle class who finds employment as a novice carpenter on Nantucket, transitions to self-employment as a designer and maker of fine furniture, takes a turn at teaching and administration at Colorado's Anderson Ranch Arts Center, and then founds a school in Maine: the Center for Furniture Craftsmanship, an internationally respected nonprofit institution.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Must Read
- By Ray on 06-19-14
By: Peter Korn
-
The Lonely City
- Adventures in the Art of Being Alone
- By: Olivia Laing
- Narrated by: Susan Lyons
- Length: 9 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 284
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 236
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 233
An expertly crafted work of reportage, memoir, and biography on the subject of loneliness told through the lives of six iconic artists, by the acclaimed author of The Trip to Echo Spring. You can be lonely anywhere, but there is a particular flavor to the loneliness that comes from living in a city, surrounded by thousands of strangers. The Lonely City is a roving cultural history of urban loneliness, centered on the ultimate city: Manhattan, that teeming island of gneiss, concrete, and glass.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Not what I wanted
- By Katarina Riesing on 06-04-18
By: Olivia Laing
-
How to Be an Artist
- By: Jerry Saltz
- Narrated by: Jerry Saltz
- Length: 2 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 534
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 431
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 424
Art has the power to change our lives. For many, becoming an artist is a lifelong dream. But how to make it happen? In How to Be an Artist, Jerry Saltz, one of the art world’s most celebrated and passionate voices, offers an indispensable handbook for creative people of all kinds. From the first sparks of inspiration - and how to pursue them without giving in to self-doubt - Saltz offers invaluable insight into what really matters to emerging artists: originality, persistence, a balance between knowledge and intuition, and that most precious of qualities, self-belief.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Terrible Book Waste of Money
- By Classic on 04-22-20
By: Jerry Saltz
-
Bobos in Paradise
- The New Upper Class and How They Got There
- By: David Brooks
- Narrated by: David Brooks
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 276
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 142
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 139
It used to be pretty easy to distinguish between the bourgeois world of capitalism and the bohemian counterculture. The bourgeois worked for corporations, wore gray, and went to church. The bohemians were artists and intellectuals. Bohemians championed the values of the liberated 1960s; the bourgeois were the enterprising yuppies of the 1980s.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
A magazine article stretched to book length
- By Brian on 08-17-03
By: David Brooks
-
What W. H. Auden Can Do for You
- Alexander McCall Smith
- By: Alexander McCall Smith
- Narrated by: William Neenan
- Length: 2 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 105
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 93
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 89
When facing a moral dilemma, Isabel Dalhousie--Edinburgh philosopher, amateur detective, and title character of a series of novels by best-selling author Alexander McCall Smith - often refers to the great twentieth-century poet W. H. Auden. This is no accident: McCall Smith has long been fascinated by Auden. Indeed, the novelist, best known for his No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series, calls the poet not only the greatest literary discovery of his life but also the best of guides on how to live.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
On the Power of Poetry, Mostly Auden's
- By Rich S. on 12-09-13
-
The Rise
- Creativity, the Gift of Failure, and the Search for Mastery
- By: Sarah Lewis
- Narrated by: Sarah Lewis
- Length: 6 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 169
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 143
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 143
It is one of the enduring enigmas of the human experience: many of our most iconic, creative endeavors - from Nobel Prize-winning discoveries to entrepreneurial inventions and works in the arts - are not achievements but conversions, corrections after failed attempts. The gift of failure is a riddle. Like the number zero, it will always be both a void and the start of infinite possibility. The Rise - a soulful celebration of the determination and courage of the human spirit - makes the case that many of our greatest triumphs come from understanding the importance of this mystery.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Inspiring and artful
- By james kenly on 06-13-16
By: Sarah Lewis
-
On Photography
- By: Susan Sontag
- Narrated by: Jennifer Van Dyck
- Length: 6 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 259
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 218
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 213
First published in 1973, this is a study of the force of photographic images, which are continually inserted between experience and reality. When anything can be photographed, and photography has destroyed the boundaries and definitions of art, a viewer can approach a photograph freely, with no expectations of discovering what it means. This collection of six lucid and invigorating essays, with the most famous being "In Plato's Cave", make up a deep exploration of how the image has affected society.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
I'm Glad I Bought, Despite Some Negative Reviews
- By DEF on 10-18-13
By: Susan Sontag
-
Magic and Loss
- The Internet as Art
- By: Virginia Heffernan
- Narrated by: Candace Thaxton, Virginia Heffernan - introduction
- Length: 7 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 55
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 47
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 47
Just as Susan Sontag did for photography and Marshall McLuhan did for television, Virginia Heffernan (called one of the "best living writers of English prose") reveals the logic and aesthetics behind the Internet. Since its inception, the Internet has morphed from merely an extension of traditional media into its own full-fledged civilization. It is among mankind's great masterpieces - a massive work of art. As an idea, it rivals monotheism.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Title is misleading
- By Maija Kovari on 08-22-19
-
A Month in Siena
- By: Hisham Matar
- Narrated by: Hisham Matar
- Length: 3 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 42
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 34
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 34
After finishing his powerful memoir The Return, Hisham Matar, seeking solace and pleasure, traveled to Siena, Italy. Always finding comfort and clarity in great art, Matar immersed himself in eight significant works from the Sienese School of painting, which flourished from the 13th to the 15th centuries. Artists he had admired throughout his life, including Duccio and Ambrogio Lorenzetti, evoke earlier engagements he'd had with works by Caravaggio and Poussin, and the personal experiences that surrounded those moments.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
An atmospheric ramble (in the best sense!)
- By M. O. on 06-19-21
By: Hisham Matar
-
A Very Irregular Head
- The Life of Syd Barrett
- By: Rob Chapman
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 13 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 246
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 216
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 213
Roger Keith “Syd” Barrett was the definition of a golden boy. With good looks and an aptitude for music, he was a charismatic child who fast became a teenage leader in 1960s England. Along with three school chums - Roger Waters, Richard Wright, and Nick Mason - he formed what would become Pink Floyd.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Very Touching
- By Ajit on 05-01-17
By: Rob Chapman
-
How Fiction Works
- By: James Wood
- Narrated by: James Adams
- Length: 5 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 131
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 85
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 87
Ranging widely from Homer to David Foster Wallace, from What Maisie Knew to Make Way for Ducklings, Wood takes the reader through the basic elements of the art, step by step. He sums up two decades of insight with wit and concision, resulting in nothing less than a philosophy of the novel, which has won critical acclaim nationwide, from the San Francisco Chronicle to the New York Times Book Review.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Educational!
- By Don on 05-04-09
By: James Wood
-
Why Architecture Matters
- By: Paul Goldberger
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 100
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 77
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 76
The purpose of Why Architecture Matters is to "come to grips with how things feel to us when we stand before them, with how architecture affects us emotionally as well as intellectually" - with its impact on our lives. "Architecture begins to matter," writes Paul Goldberger, "when it brings delight and sadness and perplexity and awe along with a roof over our heads."
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Reading too mechanical
- By Petrie on 09-01-15
By: Paul Goldberger
-
The Art of Cruelty
- A Reckoning
- By: Maggie Nelson
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert
- Length: 8 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 92
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 80
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 80
Today both reality and entertainment crowd our fields of vision with brutal imagery. The pervasiveness of images of torture, horror, and war has all but demolished the 20th-century hope that such imagery might shock us into a less alienated state, or aid in the creation of a just social order. What to do now? When to look, when to turn away? Genre-busting author Maggie Nelson brilliantly navigates this contemporary predicament, with an eye to the question of whether or not focusing on representations of cruelty makes us cruel.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Wonderful book, mediocre narration
- By Melina on 11-14-17
By: Maggie Nelson
-
The Art of Rivalry
- Four Friendships, Betrayals, and Breakthroughs in Modern Art
- By: Sebastian Smee
- Narrated by: Bob Souer
- Length: 10 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 228
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 195
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 195
Rivalry is at the heart of some of the most famous and fruitful relationships in history. The Art of Rivalry follows eight celebrated artists, each linked to a counterpart by friendship, admiration, envy, and ambition. All eight are household names today. But to achieve what they did, each needed the influence of a contemporary - one who was equally ambitious but who possessed sharply contrasting strengths and weaknesses.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Death by bob souer
- By SKWAD on 01-18-18
By: Sebastian Smee
-
Intimations
- Six Essays
- By: Zadie Smith
- Narrated by: Zadie Smith
- Length: 1 hr and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 388
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 327
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 326
Written during the early months of lockdown, Intimations explores ideas and questions prompted by an unprecedented situation. What does it mean to submit to a new reality - or to resist it? How do we compare relative sufferings? What is the relationship between time and work? In our isolation, what do other people mean to us? How do we think about them? What is the ratio of contempt to compassion in a crisis? When an unfamiliar world arrives, what does it reveal about the world that came before it?
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
An eye-opener for me into our inequitable systems
- By Rashida L on 07-29-20
By: Zadie Smith
-
Latest Readings
- By: Clive James
- Narrated by: Graeme Malcolm
- Length: 3 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 31
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 28
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 27
In 2010 Clive James was diagnosed with terminal leukemia. Deciding that "if you don't know the exact moment when the lights will go out, you might as well read until they do", James moved his library to his house in Cambridge, where he would "live, read, and perhaps even write". James is the award-winning author of dozens of works of literary criticism, poetry, and history, and this volume contains his reflections on what may well be his last reading list.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Clive James the one and only
- By Amazon Customer on 01-05-23
By: Clive James
-
Ghosts of My Life
- Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost Futures
- By: Mark Fisher
- Narrated by: Tom Lawrence
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 62
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 47
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 47
This collection of writings by Mark Fisher, author of the acclaimed Capitalist Realism, argues that we are haunted by futures that failed to happen. Fisher searches for the traces of these lost futures in the work of David Peace, John Le Carré, Christopher Nolan, Joy Division, Burial, and many others.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
An anthology of varying interest
- By Tezby on 07-31-21
By: Mark Fisher
Publisher's summary
Join the art critic Ben Eastham on a private tour of an extraordinary museum. Let him walk you through a building constructed from memory and filled with a series of bewildering art works, while he delivers a guide comprised of personal experience, professional expertise and sympathy.
In this stunningly original book, an introduction to contemporary art is combined with the author's own memories and reflections on what art means. With the help of a cast of interfering security guards, pretentious curators, sceptical visitors, angry protestors and elusive ghosts, Eastham proposes that the art of today offers a way of understanding our increasingly strange and complex times.
Eastham doesn't ask you to like the artworks in his imaginary museum, but offers the tools for you to formulate and express your own opinion of them. He argues that art should be judged by the feelings it provokes and the conversations it generates: in talking about art, we learn to talk about ourselves and the world in which we live.
Related to this topic
-
The Contemporaries
- Travels in the 21st-Century Art World
- By: Roger White
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 8 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 84
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 69
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 71
From young artists trying to elbow their way in to those working hard at dropping out, White's essential audiobook offers a once-in-a-generation glimpse of the inner workings of the American art world at a moment of unparalleled ambition, uncertainty, and creative exuberance.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Mispronunciations Spoil This Reading!
- By Jenny Jenkins on 06-17-15
By: Roger White
-
What Are You Looking At?
- The Surprising, Shocking, and Sometimes Strange Story of 150 Years of Modern Art
- By: Will Gompertz
- Narrated by: Matthew Waterson
- Length: 13 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 142
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 117
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 116
What is modern art? Who started it? Why do we either love it or loathe it? And why is it such big money? Join BBC Arts Editor Will Gompertz on a dazzling tour that will change the way you look at modern art forever. From Monet's water lilies to Van Gogh's sunflowers, from Warhol's soup cans to Hirst's pickled shark, hear the stories behind the masterpieces, meet the artists as they really were, and discover the real point of modern art.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
A simply wonderful book with a serious flaw
- By 11104 on 05-02-21
By: Will Gompertz
-
Art Is Life
- Icons and Iconoclasts, Visionaries and Vigilantes, and Flashes of Hope in the Night
- By: Jerry Saltz
- Narrated by: Jerry Saltz, Mark Bramhall
- Length: 16 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 92
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 76
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 76
Jerry Saltz is one of our most-watched writers about art and artists and a passionate champion of the importance of art in our shared cultural life. Since the 1990s he has been an indispensable cultural voice: Witty and provocative, he has attracted contemporary listeners to fine art as few critics have.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
WRONG for audio program
- By Karen Lehrer on 11-07-22
By: Jerry Saltz
-
From Bauhaus to Our House
- By: Tom Wolfe
- Narrated by: Dennis McKee
- Length: 3 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 276
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 191
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 192
In Tom Wolfe's hands, the strange saga of American architecture in the 20th century makes for both high comedy and intellectual excitement. This is his sequel to The Painted Word, the book that caused such a furor in the art world five years before. Once again Wolfe shows how social and intellectual fashions have determined aesthetic form in our time and how willingly the creators have abandoned personal vision and originality in order to work a la mode.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
So snarky I kept having to back up and repeat
- By Ellen on 04-08-09
By: Tom Wolfe
-
The Geography of Genius
- A Search for the World's Most Creative Places from Ancient Athens to Silicon Valley
- By: Eric Weiner
- Narrated by: Eric Weiner
- Length: 14 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 490
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 427
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 425
In The Geography of Genius, acclaimed travel writer Weiner sets out to examine the connection between our surroundings and our most innovative ideas. He explores the history of places, like Vienna of 1900, Renaissance Florence, ancient Athens, Song Dynasty Hangzhou, and Silicon Valley, to show how certain urban settings are conducive to ingenuity.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Very, very disappointing
- By Tamara Greer on 06-08-16
By: Eric Weiner
-
Known and Strange Things
- Essays
- By: Teju Cole
- Narrated by: Peter Jay Fernandez
- Length: 12 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 48
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 42
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 40
With this collection of more than 50 pieces on politics, photography, travel, history, and literature, Teju Cole solidifies his place as one of today's most powerful and original voices. Minute after minute, deploying prose dense with beauty and ideas, he finds fresh and potent ways to interpret art, people, and historical moments, taking in subjects from Virginia Woolf, Shakespeare, and W. G. Sebald to Instagram, Barack Obama, and Boko Haram.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A Book that Teaches and Shares
- By Carolyn J. on 10-08-17
By: Teju Cole
-
The Contemporaries
- Travels in the 21st-Century Art World
- By: Roger White
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 8 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 84
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 69
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 71
From young artists trying to elbow their way in to those working hard at dropping out, White's essential audiobook offers a once-in-a-generation glimpse of the inner workings of the American art world at a moment of unparalleled ambition, uncertainty, and creative exuberance.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Mispronunciations Spoil This Reading!
- By Jenny Jenkins on 06-17-15
By: Roger White
-
What Are You Looking At?
- The Surprising, Shocking, and Sometimes Strange Story of 150 Years of Modern Art
- By: Will Gompertz
- Narrated by: Matthew Waterson
- Length: 13 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 142
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 117
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 116
What is modern art? Who started it? Why do we either love it or loathe it? And why is it such big money? Join BBC Arts Editor Will Gompertz on a dazzling tour that will change the way you look at modern art forever. From Monet's water lilies to Van Gogh's sunflowers, from Warhol's soup cans to Hirst's pickled shark, hear the stories behind the masterpieces, meet the artists as they really were, and discover the real point of modern art.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
A simply wonderful book with a serious flaw
- By 11104 on 05-02-21
By: Will Gompertz
-
Art Is Life
- Icons and Iconoclasts, Visionaries and Vigilantes, and Flashes of Hope in the Night
- By: Jerry Saltz
- Narrated by: Jerry Saltz, Mark Bramhall
- Length: 16 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 92
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 76
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 76
Jerry Saltz is one of our most-watched writers about art and artists and a passionate champion of the importance of art in our shared cultural life. Since the 1990s he has been an indispensable cultural voice: Witty and provocative, he has attracted contemporary listeners to fine art as few critics have.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
WRONG for audio program
- By Karen Lehrer on 11-07-22
By: Jerry Saltz
-
From Bauhaus to Our House
- By: Tom Wolfe
- Narrated by: Dennis McKee
- Length: 3 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 276
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 191
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 192
In Tom Wolfe's hands, the strange saga of American architecture in the 20th century makes for both high comedy and intellectual excitement. This is his sequel to The Painted Word, the book that caused such a furor in the art world five years before. Once again Wolfe shows how social and intellectual fashions have determined aesthetic form in our time and how willingly the creators have abandoned personal vision and originality in order to work a la mode.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
So snarky I kept having to back up and repeat
- By Ellen on 04-08-09
By: Tom Wolfe
-
The Geography of Genius
- A Search for the World's Most Creative Places from Ancient Athens to Silicon Valley
- By: Eric Weiner
- Narrated by: Eric Weiner
- Length: 14 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 490
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 427
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 425
In The Geography of Genius, acclaimed travel writer Weiner sets out to examine the connection between our surroundings and our most innovative ideas. He explores the history of places, like Vienna of 1900, Renaissance Florence, ancient Athens, Song Dynasty Hangzhou, and Silicon Valley, to show how certain urban settings are conducive to ingenuity.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Very, very disappointing
- By Tamara Greer on 06-08-16
By: Eric Weiner
-
Known and Strange Things
- Essays
- By: Teju Cole
- Narrated by: Peter Jay Fernandez
- Length: 12 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 48
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 42
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 40
With this collection of more than 50 pieces on politics, photography, travel, history, and literature, Teju Cole solidifies his place as one of today's most powerful and original voices. Minute after minute, deploying prose dense with beauty and ideas, he finds fresh and potent ways to interpret art, people, and historical moments, taking in subjects from Virginia Woolf, Shakespeare, and W. G. Sebald to Instagram, Barack Obama, and Boko Haram.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A Book that Teaches and Shares
- By Carolyn J. on 10-08-17
By: Teju Cole
-
So Much Longing in So Little Space
- The Art of Edvard Munch
- By: Karl Ove Knausgaard
- Narrated by: Matthew Waterson
- Length: 5 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 58
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 47
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 46
In So Much Longing in So Little Space, Karl Ove Knausgaard sets out to understand the enduring and awesome power of Edvard Munch's work by training his gaze on the landscapes that inspired Munch and speaking firsthand with other contemporary artists, including Anselm Kiefer, for whom Munch's legacy looms large. Bringing together art history, biography, and memoir, Knausgaard tells a passionate, freewheeling, and pensive story about not just one of history's most significant painters, but the very meaning of choosing the artist's life, as he himself has done.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
not just for Munch fans
- By Alexander on 08-19-24
-
Letters to a Young Artist
- By: Anna Deavere Smith
- Narrated by: Anna Deavere Smith
- Length: 4 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 86
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 55
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 53
From "the most exciting individual in American theater" ( Newsweek), here is Anna Deavere Smith's brass-tacks advice to aspiring artists of all stripes. In the manner of Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, Deavere Smith mentors her young artist over a period of five years, sharing her hard-won wisdom about the challenges and rewards of the artistic life.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Great advice for artists of any age.
- By S. Barker on 10-30-17
-
In Montparnasse
- The Emergence of Surrealism in Paris, from Duchamp to Dalí
- By: Sue Roe
- Narrated by: Kristin Atherton
- Length: 11 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 67
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 58
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 58
In Montparnasse begins on the eve of the First World War and ends with the 1936 unveiling of Dalí’s Lobster Telephone. As those extraordinary years unfolded, the Surrealists found ever more innovative ways of exploring the interior life, and asking new questions about how to define art. In Montparnasse recounts how this artistic revolution came to be amidst the salons and cafés of that vibrant neighborhood.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Great Second of Two Books
- By Robert Keith on 10-26-19
By: Sue Roe
-
Where the Heart Beats
- John Cage, Zen Buddhism, and the Inner Life of Artists
- By: Kay Larson
- Narrated by: Jason Wineinger
- Length: 15 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 61
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 52
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 51
Composer John Cage sought the silence of a mind at peace with itself - and found it in Zen Buddhism, a spiritual path that changed both his music and his view of the universe. "Remarkably researched, exquisitely written", Where the Heart Beats weaves together "a great many threads of cultural history" (Maria Popova, Brain Pickings) to illuminate Cage’s struggle to accept himself and his relationship with choreographer Merce Cunningham. Freed to be his own man, Cage originated exciting experiments that set him at the epicenter of a new avant-garde forming in the 1950s.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Mind Expansion
- By Robert Keith on 04-04-15
By: Kay Larson
-
ArtCurious
- Stories of the Unexpected, Slightly Odd, and Strangely Wonderful in Art History
- By: Jennifer Dasal
- Narrated by: Jennifer Dasal
- Length: 9 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 108
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 95
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 95
We're all familiar with the works of Claude Monet, thanks in no small part to the ubiquitous reproductions of his water lilies on umbrellas, handbags, scarves, and dorm-room posters. But did you also know Monet and his cohort were trailblazing rebels whose works were originally deemed unbelievably ugly and vulgar? And while you probably know the tale of Vincent van Gogh's suicide, you may not be aware that there's pretty compelling evidence that the artist didn't die by his own hand but was accidentally killed - or even murdered.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Couldn’t take it
- By Amira on 03-05-22
By: Jennifer Dasal
-
Why Architecture Matters
- By: Paul Goldberger
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 100
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 77
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 76
The purpose of Why Architecture Matters is to "come to grips with how things feel to us when we stand before them, with how architecture affects us emotionally as well as intellectually" - with its impact on our lives. "Architecture begins to matter," writes Paul Goldberger, "when it brings delight and sadness and perplexity and awe along with a roof over our heads."
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Reading too mechanical
- By Petrie on 09-01-15
By: Paul Goldberger
-
How Fiction Works
- By: James Wood
- Narrated by: James Adams
- Length: 5 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 131
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 85
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 87
Ranging widely from Homer to David Foster Wallace, from What Maisie Knew to Make Way for Ducklings, Wood takes the reader through the basic elements of the art, step by step. He sums up two decades of insight with wit and concision, resulting in nothing less than a philosophy of the novel, which has won critical acclaim nationwide, from the San Francisco Chronicle to the New York Times Book Review.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Educational!
- By Don on 05-04-09
By: James Wood
-
The Art of Rivalry
- Four Friendships, Betrayals, and Breakthroughs in Modern Art
- By: Sebastian Smee
- Narrated by: Bob Souer
- Length: 10 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 228
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 195
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 195
Rivalry is at the heart of some of the most famous and fruitful relationships in history. The Art of Rivalry follows eight celebrated artists, each linked to a counterpart by friendship, admiration, envy, and ambition. All eight are household names today. But to achieve what they did, each needed the influence of a contemporary - one who was equally ambitious but who possessed sharply contrasting strengths and weaknesses.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Death by bob souer
- By SKWAD on 01-18-18
By: Sebastian Smee
-
Tom and Jack
- The Intertwined Lives of Thomas Hart Benton and Jackson Pollock
- By: Henry Adams
- Narrated by: Wayne Thompson
- Length: 11 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 46
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 41
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 41
The drip paintings of Jackson Pollock, trailblazing Abstract Expressionist, appear to be the polar opposite of Thomas Hart Benton's highly figurative Americana. Yet the two men had a close and highly charged relationship dating from Pollock's days as a student under Benton. Pollock's first and only formal training came from Benton, and the older man soon became a surrogate father to Pollock.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
I suggest you READ, not listen...
- By Grace O'Malley on 07-01-16
By: Henry Adams
-
In Montmartre
- Picasso, Matisse and the Birth of Modernist Art
- By: Sue Roe
- Narrated by: Emma Bering
- Length: 12 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 259
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 220
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 220
A lively and deeply researched group biography of the figures who transformed the world of art in bohemian Paris in the first decade of the 20th century. In Montmartre is a colorful history of the birth of Modernist art as it arose from one of the most astonishing collections of artistic talent ever assembled. It begins in October 1900, as a teenage Pablo Picasso, eager for fame and fortune, first makes his way up the hillside of Paris’s famous windmill-topped district.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Florid narrative history with suspect details
- By Keith on 10-30-19
By: Sue Roe
-
At the Existentialist Café
- Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails
- By: Sarah Bakewell
- Narrated by: Antonia Beamish
- Length: 14 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,062
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 936
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 930
Paris, 1933: Three contemporaries meet over apricot cocktails at the Bec-de-Gaz bar on the rue Montparnasse. They are the young Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and longtime friend Raymond Aron, a fellow philosopher who raves to them about a new conceptual framework from Berlin called phenomenology. "You see," he says, "if you are a phenomenologist, you can talk about this cocktail and make philosophy out of it!"
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Consistent look at incoherent philosophy
- By Gary on 06-19-16
By: Sarah Bakewell
-
The Mark on the Wall
- By: Virginia Woolf
- Narrated by: Teresa Gallagher
- Length: 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 47
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 44
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 44
This is a story from the Classic Women's Short Stories collection.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Just a stunning piece
- By Alfie on 08-07-22
By: Virginia Woolf